Eye on Iran: Fate of Iran Deal to Land Back in Trump’s Hands

Two months after Donald Trump offloaded to Congress a decision on whether to reimpose sanctions on Iran over its nuclear programme, lawmakers are set to hand the contentious issue back to the president after missing a deadline to deal with it. Mr Trump vowed in October to scrap the agreement unless Congress and US allies intervened to fix his concerns. In January, he faces deadlines to recertify the deal and waive sanctions or break the pact, with no signs of success in Congress in helping to finding a way through.

Congress is about to miss what was widely seen as a deadline to deal with President Trump’s demands for a harder line on the Iran nuclear deal, failing to agree on new sanctions against Tehran and punting the future of the deal back to Mr. Trump. A Republican legislative push to establish new “triggers” that could reimpose harsh sanctions on Iran lifted under the Obama-era deal has gone nowhere ahead of Tuesday — the end of a 60-day unofficial deadline set by the administration for Capitol Hill to weigh in on the situation after Mr. Trump declared he could no longer certify that the accord was in the U.S. national interest. Congressional aides say lawmakers still have time to propose something before Mr. Trump is mandated to decide again whether to weigh in on the deal, but White House aides say the president is rankled by the lack of progress on Capitol Hill and likely will pull the United States out of the deal entirely when it comes up for review on Jan. 13.

A pair of senior GOP lawmakers are pushing to impose sanctions on Iran for its destabilizing activities in Yemen as the House prepares to vote this week on legislation to crack down on the country’s financing of terrorism. Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) and Ted Poe (R-Texas), both senior members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, introduced a bill to sanction Iran for its support for the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

In October, President Donald Trump took an important step toward countering Iran’s ever-expanding list of illicit activities by refusing to certify to Congress that the flawed nuclear deal negotiated by the Obama administration remained in America’s national security interest. Now he needs to stop Congress from giving away the leverage he established.

Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital will hasten the country’s destruction, Iran’s defense minister said on Monday, while a top Revolutionary Guards commander phoned two Palestinian armed groups and pledged support for them.

Britain's Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson visited Iran on Dec. 10. Ahead of the trip, Johnson said that he would address British concerns over the imprisonment of dual national Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who was arrested and sentenced in 2016 to five years in prison.

Europe’s borders are bloody. From Ukraine in the east to Libya and Syria in the south, war has brought mass migration, terrorism and political instability to a continent ill-equipped to do much about the underlying problem. Yet while the European Union’s soft power can’t stop conflicts, it could help prevent the outbreak of a new one—between Israel and Iran, aided by its proxy Hezbollah.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani presented the draft budget for the fiscal year 2018-19 to the parliament on Sunday, defending it in an hour-long speech. The budget showed allocations to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) were three times that of the army. Quds Force and the Revolutionary Program are a priority in the new budget, according to informed parliamentary sources.

Russian President Vladimir Putin told Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Monday he wanted to work with Iran and Turkey to kick-start the Syrian peace process, Russian news agencies reported.

IRAQ CRISIS

U.S. Looks to Counter Iran in Postwar Iraq | Associated Press
As Iraq emerges from three years of war with Daesh (ISIS), the U.S. is looking to roll back the influence of neighboring Iran and help the central government resolve its dispute with the Kurdish region, the American envoy to the country told the Associated Press.

The Houthi militia is facing intense pressure from Iran demanding that they transport the body of Iranian missile expert, Hussein Khasrawy, to Tehran for a proper burial, according to sources close to the militia’s leaders.

Once again, Iran’s former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has made headlines following his controversial remarks targeting judiciary chief Ayatollah Sadegh Amoli Larijani and his brother, parliament Speaker Ali Larijani. The war of words illustrates yet again Ahmadinejad’s typical strategy, which is to attack influential political families to gain more popularity with the public.

An earthquake of magnitude 6.1 struck northeast of Kerman, a provincial capital in Iran, the U.S. Geological Survey said. There were no immediate reports of damage or casualties in the quake, which hit at a depth of 57 km (35 miles).